The Maiden Voyage

We took the trailer out for its maiden voyage last weekend.  (Although technically John took it to father and son's but I don't count that because I wasn't there.)  The week was filled with ups and downs and very few pictures because we couldn't find our camera. We found it when we got home.  But I did take my phone on one of our hikes so we have exactly 5 pictures to commemorate the event.  That's right, 5.

I got some real beauties didn't I? And now I will proceed to tell you of the ups and downs of our trip.  And there were many.

Down:  We had to put air bags on the back tires of our van to pull the trailer properly.  We were loaded and ready to go and realized that the airbags weren't holding air.  So the first stop on our trip was to commercial tire. Where John spent the next 3 hours with Clark and the boys and I headed up to get a campsite with Alison and the girls. 

Up:  Once fixed the van pulled the trailer just fin. It didn't even struggle on the big hills.

Down:  Due to disagreements over where the different trailers should be parked, we ended up parking our trailer on a bumpy grassy area.  The trailer rolled off the block twice and one of the stabilizer legs broke.  We were off to a great start.

Up:  Clark is super handy and fixed the stabilizer.  Crisis averted.

Down: Rain. Off and on for our first two days.  I do not enjoy camping in the rain.  It involved a serious lack of socks for my children. Constant wet feet, never enough sun to dry everything out.

Up:  We were less than a quarter mile from a huge hot springs, so although it was raining, we hung out in the nice warm water and enjoyed being wet.

Down: Complete and utter Hurricane-like down pour. I was honestly surprised we stayed dry because it was raining so hard.  I could touch water when I touched the canvas and pillows that touched the sides got wet.

Up:  The trailer survived the downpour without any leaking.  No drips.  And we weren't in a tent.  We would have been soaked! 

Down:  The heater broke.  Upon much inspection and attempts to fix it, by the second night the igniter on the heater was declared officially dead.  We froze.  I hadn't packed many extra blankets due to the excitement of finally having a heater.  Lesson learned.

Up: The rain stopped by Saturday morning and by lunch time we were completely dried out.

Up:  We hiked up to an old lookout from the 1930's that is still manned.  It was interesting talking to the deputy on duty.  Sounds like a horribly boring job sitting alone at the top of a mountain looking for fire and what not but still cool at the same time.

Up:  Smore's, woof 'ems, dutch oven, foil dinners, and all sorts of other yummy camp food. 

Up:  Kids playing constantly with minimal fighting.  Rare these days.  And honestly, that's most of the reason I camp.  Just to have my kids outdoors and away from electronic overload.

Up:  Syd had her baby while we were camping.  3 weeks early!  I found out when we got service on our way back into town.  Doesn't really fit with this post but I'll stick it in anyways.  And she's blessing her baby over the weekend of our next scheduled camping trip.....not sure if that's good or bad :)

I'd say in the end that the ups out weighed the downs. 
And now we know to fix the heater before we head out again. 
Which sadly won't be until September. 
How did our summer get so packed that we don't have time to camp more!